A communication network may include a management node and one or more client nodes. The management and client nodes may correspond to a network coordinator (NC) and an existing node (EN), respectively, of a Multimedia Over Coaxial Cable Alliance (MoCA) standard, (http://www.mocalliance.org), developed for networking over coaxial cable. MoCA standards include MoCA 1.0, MoCA 1.1, and MoCA 2.0. For illustrative purposes, NC and EN terminology is herein.
An EN may be configured to transition from an operational mode to a standby mode to conserve power during periods of inactivity. In standby mode, power may be disconnected from analog and/or digital components of a transmit path and/or a receive path, including Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) modules and frequency equalizers, and subsequent digital processing elements.
A NC may transmit a wake command to an EN to cause an EN to transition from standby mode to operational mode. Under MoCA 2.0, a NC transmits periodic beacons at 10 millisecond (ms) intervals. A beacon may include a wake command. The wake command may be repeated in subsequent beacons until the EN is operational, which may be defined as data packets being passed from the EN to the NC.
Under MoCA 2.0, an EN is to monitor NC beacons to detect wake commands, and to transition from standby mode to operational mode monitor within a specified transition time following a wake command. An EN may periodically self-wake a receiver portion to a fully operational mode to receive the beacons. Where the specified transition time is significantly greater than the repetition rate of the beacons, an EN may not need to wake and recover each beacon to meet the specified transition time. Rather, to conserve power, the EN may self-wake at less frequent intervals. Nevertheless, when the receiver portion is fully operational to receive beacons, the EN may consume relatively significant amounts of power. In addition, shorter transition times are contemplated, which may result in more frequent waking to receive beacons, which may result in greater power consumption.
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